So Many Books

Early this week when I did the food meme Emily tagged me with, I promised a second one later in the week. Later in the week has now arrived. Here is the Five Kind Things meme.

1. List five kind things you do for yourself.
2. List five kind things you do for your closest friend, partner or child.
3. List five kind things you have done for a stranger.
4. Have fun!
5. Tag five people.

Five things I do for myself

1. Read. Reading is my escape, my stress relief, my land of learning. It helps me stay sane. It is like a Calgon bath.
2. Blog. It’s fun. I get to babble about books every day and no one tells me to please be quiet they are tired of me talking about books all the time. Plus, as I have mentioned before, it makes me think about what I read more deeply. And it helps me put my thoughts together after I have finished a book.
3. Look at the sky. I always make it a point to look up at least once every day or night. The sunrise yesterday was gorgeous–the bare trees dark against the gradually brightening pink and orange sky. I know sunsets get all the attention, but personally, I think sunrise is just as lovely if not more so. I could go on and on about the sky. Looking at it makes me happy because it is beautiful and because it lifts me up and out of the daily grind.
4. Bike commute to work. I hate exercise for the sake of exercise and have never been able to get myself to do it. But give me a reason for the exercise, like getting work, and I do it happily. Biking to and from work also is great stress relief especially after a long day. And I get the added benefit of laughing at all the cars sitting in traffic along my route, not paying for gas, and not adding pollutants into the air. And people are nice–neighbors, joggers and other cyclists say hello.
5. Attend library school. As much work and stress it has added to my life and will continue to add for a few years since I am going very part time at only one class per quarter, attending school makes me very happy. I finally figured out what I wanted to be when I grow up. I could have found all kinds of reasons and excuses not to go back to school but I would always regret not taking the chance and the opportunity and having regrets is no way to live.

Five things I do for my closest friend, partner, or child (I’m going with partner here)

1. Listen.
2. Make him laugh.
3. Help him with his injections. His MS medication is a daily injection. The injection is subcutaneous and supposed to be done in certain fleshy areas (thigh, hip, stomach, back of arms). My dear husband hardly has an ounce of fat on him. I somehow manage to ignore my fear of needles in order to squish up some flesh for him to inject.
4. Write him love notes.
5. Watch The Simpsons. I have nothing against The Simpsons, I just don’t like it as much as my Bookman does. But every Sunday night, I snuggle up with him to watch the show. As a result when my Bookman makes Simpsons jokes or references, I know what he is talking about which makes him really happy.

Five things I have done for a stranger

1. Given directions.
2. Held doors open. (especially if their arms are full or they have small children)
3. Allowed them to scream at me. I’ve worked in customer service before and would have someone scream at me at least once a week. The screaming happens less often these days, but with more intensity since the nonprofit I work for serves women with mental illness and chemical dependency addictions as well as women who have experienced domestic violence and/ or other kinds of abuse, and women who are going through divorce or having child custody or other family law legal issues.
4. Smiled / said hello / complimented them
5. Caught and returned their dog that has gotten out of its yard. Not as uncommon an occurrence as one would hope.

I think I will tag five people on this one. Bikkuri, Bibliophylia, Verbivore, Danielle, and Dark Orpheus. And of course, anyone else who would like to play.